


Shared

by orphan_account



Series: One Shots [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Child Abuse, Gen, Implied/Referenced Drug Addiction, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, John has a drunk father, John in Afghanistan, Kidlock, Soul Mates AU, Teenlock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-25
Updated: 2014-07-25
Packaged: 2018-02-10 10:05:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2020971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John Watson and Sherlock Holmes have absolutely nothing in common except for one small detail. They unknowingly share thoughts with one another.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shared

**Author's Note:**

> The idea for this came from [charlypezza](http://charlypezza.tumblr.com/), who has been very supportive of me writing this.
> 
> Hope you enjoy it as much as I do

They started as nightmares. John would wake up, screaming, yelling, thrashing in the sheets, desperate to be free of the confinement. There would never be anything tangible, holding him down or constricting him, only a light feeling of what he had been dreaming. He couldn’t ever remember who had been in his dreams, who he had been thinking about before he had fallen asleep. His mother was always the one who would calm him down afterward, kiss the top of his head, hush him back to sleep. John wouldn’t think about it again for the rest of the night, and his six-year-old mind was convinced that they were, in fact, simply nightmares.

 

* * *

 

They always came in the evenings. Sherlock’s four year old, attentive self had already pinned down a timeframe, had already noticed that they came between five and half six. His parents thought he was daydreaming – as if he would ever fall to such a level – and Mycroft never ever stopped teasing him. Mycroft called him crazy. Sherlock knew better, though. It was the same blond boy, every time. He knew he was blond because he had caught a glimpse of him in a mirror. Sherlock didn’t recognise him, but he knew the worry that pulsed through his veins. Drunk father. Parents yelling. Sometimes the boy would comfort his younger sister. Usually he was alone in what appeared to be his room.

 

* * *

 

“John! Do you think it would be okay if I came to your house today?” Aaron asked, jogging up to John and resting his hand on his shoulder as they walked from the school out to the playground for recess.

John hesitated, looking down as he moved to the climbing frame. He was ten, but he knew what it would mean to have a friend over. It would mean probably losing that friend, maybe having the police called, again, on his father. It was too much hassle, too much trouble to make it worth it.

“No… I think we’re doing something tonight,” John fibbed, pulling himself up to the tallest point. “I don’t remember what it was, though. Maybe tomorrow I can go to your house?”

“Yeah!” Aaron said, obviously excited about that idea. He climbed up beside John, and they sat there over recess.

_‘Leave me alone, Mycroft. I’m not stupid!’_

John frowned, scratching his head, trying to ignore the thoughts that were not his own. He was mostly used to them by now, and the images mostly stopped happening, but they were still really strange, and they bothered him more than a little.

 

* * *

 

Sherlock had to be sent home early for disrupting class. He had been fine, normal, if somewhat annoying, from the morning up until a few minutes ago.

He had started screaming and crying for no reason, cradling his arm to his chest, fire running from the appendage to the centre of his being. It hurt, it hurt _so bad_.

His mother had dried his tears, told him that nothing was wrong, he was fine and healthy. Sherlock’s eight year self made his mother promise, _promise_ to not tell Mycroft what had happened.

She had given him a lolly and left him alone in his room. Sherlock made himself go back through the moment, focusing on what had happened. He was convinced that it was the blond boy again. Something had happened to him, something or someone had broken his arm.

He wished that he knew who the blond boy was so that he could go tell him that he was sorry his arm hurt.

 

* * *

 

John was twelve when his parents had a massive row. He had hid in his room, cradling Harry against him, covering her ears and promising that it would be okay. He was terrified that his father would break his arm again, petrified that he would hurt their mother.

Gunshots fired and Harry screamed. John shushed her, trembling as he covered her mouth with his hand, trying not to focus every fibre of his being on the heavy footsteps coming up the stairs.

_‘Mycroft, please!’_

Not now, not now. I need to think.

_‘Mycroft! Someone’s going to hurt him. Please, you have to do something!’_

The door burst open and his father glared at them, a gun in his hand, a horrible gleam in his eye.

John pushed Harry behind him, trying to stay between her and their father. Sirens sounded outside, and John knew he only had to hold him off for a few more minutes, just long enough for the police to get inside and up the stairs.

“Daddy?” Harry whispered, her quiet words turning into screams when he lunged forward and grabbed John by the upper arm, pulling him from the room and dragging him down the steps.

John saw his mother, dead, saw the cops as they kicked down the door, felt his father’s hand close around his throat and he knew, he _knew_ that he was going to die.

The officers were yelling, the soft voice in his head was crying, and his father’s hand was impossibly tight.

One shot.

 

* * *

 

Sherlock coughed and choked, his hand against his throat as he regained his air, felt the blond boy do the same. Mycroft was by his side, obviously concerned for him.

Sherlock didn’t know why the images were always so clear, why the feelings were always so consuming, but he had started storing them away in his memories, putting them in rooms the way Mycroft had taught him to.

The boy was fine, alive, terrified, but he would live.

“Sherlock? Are you alright?” Mycroft asked, sitting down on his little brother’s bed.

Sherlock nodded, rubbing his upper arm. “I think so,” he murmured. “It wasn’t… it’s not me,” he said quietly, slowly. He had finally confessed to Mycroft what had been happening to him, why he would sometimes ‘freak out.’ Surprisingly, Mycroft had taken the explanation rather gracefully.

Mycroft rubbed Sherlock’s back, hoping to help calm his younger brother down.

 

* * *

 

By grade ten, John was rugby captain. He played hard, he practiced harder. Harry came to watch his games and his practices. Really, they both just wanted to be away from the orphanage as much as possible. Neither of them liked it there, but no one wanted to adopt two teenagers with their background.

John didn’t want to be adopted, anyway. He was three years from being able to leave that stupid place, and he would be old enough to take Harry with him. He just had to make it to that point.

He hadn’t heard the soft voice or seen anything that wasn’t in front of his own eyes for a long time now. Nearing two years, really. He’d written it off as childhood trauma, his own way of coping, and he’d forgotten about it.

Until now.

Halfway through a game, and he suddenly felt like he had been shot, slaughtered, ripped apart and shredded. He fell to his knees, grabbing at his chest.

He was too young to have a heart attack.

Images, vibrant, powerful, flew in front of him. The boy was crying, sobbing, he felt like he was dying. His older brother was holding him, trying to carry him away. Away from the dead dog, his best friend.

“John, John!”

He jumped back into the present, looking around with wide eyes and finally locking them on Harry, the coach crouching down beside her.

“I’m fine.”

“Maybe you should sit out the rest of the quarter,” Harry said, taking no arguments as she helped him to his feet.

 

* * *

 

Sherlock missed Redbeard. He hadn’t spoken to anyone in weeks, focusing intently on his studies, trying to make himself smarter than Mycroft, smarter than anyone. He read, and he scribbled notes, and he didn’t think about anything except for the material in front of him. He hardly ate. He ignored Mycroft and his parents completely.

He was moody, angry, depressed, and he was hiding behind a mask.

He hadn’t seen anything from the blond boy. Nothing. Not even a little blip. He was starting to get worried that something had happened to him, that he had died or something.

Then he wondered why he cared at all.

He flopped back on his bed, once more ignoring the persistent knocking on his door. Stupid Mycroft wouldn’t leave him alone.

“What are you up to?” Sherlock murmured, grabbing his Rubik’s cube and throwing it up in the air, catching it as it came down. “Come on, you have to be doing something interesting.”

_‘Really, Harry?’_

Sherlock sat up straight, staring off blankly at the wall as he tried to focus in on the words.

_‘You’re going to turn into Dad. You’re hardly fucking fifteen.’_

And then they were gone.

Sighing heavily, Sherlock collapsed back onto his bed, pulling out a book and starting to read.

His chest started to hurt after a while, and he rolled over, curling up and wondering what was happening. He started to cry, hard, wracking sobs. It took him a long time to realise it wasn’t him who was feeling so much anguish, it was the blond boy who was trying his hardest to raise his little sister right.

As soon as he had collected himself, Sherlock ran from the room and into his brother’s, throwing himself into his arms and holding on tightly.

 

* * *

 

John was graduated, and Harry had run off. He hadn’t seen her in over a month.

He was enrolled into university. He was volunteering at a clinic over the summer.

He was okay, dealing with the random images of thoughts in his head that weren’t his own. He could ignore them, mostly, though that was becoming increasingly difficult.

The boy was alone ninety percent of the time. He wanted a friend, ached for someone to talk to. He hadn’t seen his brother in over a year, and he never spoke to his parents unless he had to.

John ached for him, understanding and sympathising with him.

 

* * *

 

Sherlock hadn’t heard from the blond boy in a long time. He wished that there was some way he could force the images to come, but alas, there was none. All he could do was study in his room, conducting experiments and ignoring his parents.

He was mad at Mycroft for leaving, for not bringing him along to university. Sherlock was smart enough – he could have easily studied there, lived with Mycroft in his dorm. Anything, anything would have been better than here.

 

* * *

 

John wanted to become a doctor. He hadn’t always wanted to. He used to want to be a professional rugby player, but he hadn’t made the uni try-outs. Which was fine, really, because the images that he got of the curly-haired boy his first night of uni was enough to make him change his major.

It had been dark, cold, a typical fall night in London. The boy, currently fifteen, had been walking the streets, hands stuffed in his pockets, head down. He had been looking for a dealer, and he had found one, quickly purchasing the drug.

He hadn’t even made it home before he had injected himself.

Everything was spotty from there. John saw the boy crying, saw people pass him on the street and turn up their noses, saw his older brother walk up, and finally saw him falling into bed.

That wasn’t the last time John had dreams of a handsome boy with beautiful curls lose himself to drugs.

 

* * *

 

Sherlock woke up every night, screaming, sweating, reaching for something in the dark that was never there.

He was haunted, chased down by images and horrors that were not his own. Blinding sun, hot sand, bullets, knives, bleeding wounds, screaming soldiers.

Tonight wasn’t the same.

He couldn’t stop screaming, clutching at his shoulder, feeling the burning agony ripping through him. He didn’t even realise that he was crying until Mrs Hudson ran into his room to comfort him, gently drying his cheeks and soothing him.

Sherlock wouldn’t be soothed. Not with the blond boy – soldier, captain – bleeding out in the sand.

And then it stopped. Everything, every bit of agony, pain, connection, seeped away, replaced by a cold calm.

 

* * *

 

John sat uncomfortably in the cab with Mike, staring out the window, his cane between them. Since the war, he had stopped getting thoughts from the curly-haired boy – man, machine – and as much as John didn’t want to admit it, he felt as if they had exchanged purposes in the world. The last thought he had shared with him had been that of the other man joining with NSY to solve murders.

He had people in his life now, friends, even.

John didn’t have anyone.

“We’re here, then,” Mike said, paying the cabbie and getting out, waiting for John on the pavement.

It took a great deal of effort for John to follow. He knew he needed a flatmate, but like he had told Mike, who would want him? A damaged man, fresh back from the war, who suffered severe PTSD.

Mike tried to talk to him as they took the lift down to the basement of Bart’s.

Oh, good. His new potential flatmate was in the morgue. John’s luck, the man would be dead.

He’d probably get along better with a dead man than anyone that housed a pulse, took a breath.

John froze as soon as they stepped inside. The man on the other side of the table looked up, just a glance, and then did a double take.

They both straightened up to their full heights.

“Mike, give me a moment with my new flatmate, will you?” he asked, stepping toward John.

“Who said anything about flatmates?” John asked, turning to watch Mike leave before his eyes were back on the other man.

“I did,” he replied, holding his hand out. “Sherlock Holmes,” he introduced.

“John Watson.”

Sherlock smiled, shaking John’s hand. “Afghanistan or Iraq?”

“Something tells me you already know.”

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Repeated Image](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2182959) by [YawningOverTheTapestries](https://archiveofourown.org/users/YawningOverTheTapestries/pseuds/YawningOverTheTapestries)




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